Chaos Before Order

Here is the beautiful Alyssa making Christmas cookies in her Mom's kitchen. Where's Carol? Well, before she emerged with camera she was hiding in the closet so she wouldn't have to look at the kitchen disaster! From her closet she was sending out phone SOS's to friends like me! I wish Alyssa would come here and make Christmas cookies in my kitchen. I'm okay with disasters. One look at my kitchen and you know why.

Radiation Treatment Status: 25 done. 5 to go! Thank the Lord it's nearing DONE!! I'm glad I have 2 days off. The area is becoming quite sore now and I'm not the happiest of campers on the inside. Today was my last major radiation treatment. The next 5 are boosters and are directed straight on my breast. The radiation therapist explained to me that the treatments I've had up to now have been x-ray type beams that go right through me (I have a red square on my back where the beams exit). The next 5 will be proton beams that only go a short way below the surface of my skin, which is why they can be aimed directly at the area without worrying about them going as far as my heart and lungs. Excuse my elementary explanation and I can't say I have it entirely correct, but that's what I pulled out of the more technical explanation I was given.

Yesterday I had hoped to get out and run a few Christmas type errands but I never left the house. I just didn't feel all that great ... I was tired ... I was chilled to the bone. Blah! Blah! Blah! Kevin and I watched a movie last night. That was my speed. I had trouble getting to sleep at night just because I was so uncomfortable. I finally got up and tried the saline solution compress. I read on the couch while being saline compressed and it did soothe things a bit. I don't know how saline solution soothes but remarkably it does.

While I was lounged on the couch, Luke came home with Evan, Davis and Sloane. I hadn't seen the girls for a long time because they were traveling much of last year. It was wonderful to see them! I really miss Luke's and Hannah's friends who have always been such a big part of our lives and I love that they come by when our kids are home. I think I freaked Sloane and Davis out a little, though, since I didn't have my props (wig and face paint) handy. Without props I really do look like someone who should be in a hospital ward. Poor girls. I hung around long enough to have some laughs and make sure they recognized the me inside and then I high-tailed it to bed where I was able to get comfortable enough to sleep. I'm a left side sleeper and now have to sleep on my right side, which wouldn't be an issue except that it makes me nervous having had some bad experiences before. Bad experiences being hit in the face and sneezed and coughed at directly in the face. It's nothing Kevin could help, of course, since he was asleep at the time but I've always slept facing the wall as a matter of self preservation.

Thanks, Kevin, for coaching me through last night. It's almost over.